Antonio Banderas

ANTONIO BANDERAS (Málaga, 1960).
Untitled, from the series "Secretos en negro", Málaga, 2010.
Digital photography on paper on Dibond.
Series exhibited at the Cervantes Institute in Madrid in 2010.
Without signature.
Measurements: 75 x 100 cm.

In this scene of clear theatrical and cinematographic inspiration, Antonio Banderas recreates a game of cards apparently informal but full of latent tensions. The photograph presents three men and a woman around a card table, composing a choral tableau that dramatizes the codes of power, desire and representation within an enclosed, almost scenic space. The three men, dressed in white shirts that contrast sharply with the stark black background, are absorbed in the game: one holds a cigar with a confident gesture, another casts a sidelong glance at the woman, and the third, with a frown, looks worriedly at his cards. Their expressions reflect different degrees of concentration, tension or distraction, which builds an implicit narrative of competition, suspicion and desire. In the face of this male restraint, the female figure, seated uninhibitedly, bursts into open laughter as she rests her bare legs on the table, shamelessly invading the space the men have reserved for the game. She wears very little clothing: a long, shiny necklace on her bare skin acts as the only visible adornment, accentuating her power of seduction and setting her apart from the formal code of the rest of the characters. In one hand she holds the cards, but her attitude suggests that for her the game is not in the cards, but in the scene itself.

Antonio Banderas has developed in parallel to his film career, especially in recent decades, a photographic work that has become known in international exhibitions. "Secrets in black" is the title of the series to which the photograph we are bidding for belongs, a series made up of 23 photographs brimming with theatricality and glamour, in which women appear as independent and empowered. She uses myths and references from literature, painting or opera and linked to Spanish culture such as Carmen, Don Juan Tenorio, The Barber of Seville or Goya's "La Maja Desnuda". From these references, he creates a sensual and elegant atmosphere in an intimate and studied environment. This series could be seen at the Cervantes Institute in Madrid in 2010.

Her work in Secrets on Black is characterized by a theatricalized, minimalist and conceptual staging, in which the body -generally female- becomes a vehicle for the exploration of themes such as desire, the multiplicity of the self and inner silence. The choice of black as a background unifies the series and refers to a symbolically charged space: black as the hidden, the intimate, the unconfessable.